O-So Strawberry Soda

I picked this up at Lund's last month, and it was time to try it out:

Brand: O-So Strawberry Soda.

Origin: Mukilteo, WA.

Purchase Place: Lunds Grocery Store, St. Paul, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: This wasn't an overly sweet soda. It tasted a bit "adult." In fact, I'd NEARLY call it a "strawberry rhubarb" soda because of it's flavor and lack of super sweetness. I'm not complaining - I'm just noting that if you like a syrupy sweet soda, then this isn't for you. If you like more depth of flavor, then give this a try. I'll rate this just a bit above average.

Score: 6 out of 10.

Vanilla Hi Ball Energy

I did a triathlon 2 weeks ago, and these were being handed out at the finish:

Brand: Vanilla Hi Ball Energy.

Origin: San Francisco, CA.

Purchase Place: Maple Grove Triathlon.

Sweetener: None.

Review: I saw a woman at the race dumping hers on the ground, so I didn't have high hopes. Turns out, she was 100% justified. This was horrible. It tasted like the worst possible version of La Croix water. The vanilla flavor was OK, but NOT in an unsweetened carbonated water drink. Gah. It needed about 50 grams of sugar to be drinkable. Disgusting. I only could manage a few sips of this.

Score: 1 out of 10.

Lift Bridge Root Beer Pork Roast

Over the weekend, I made a pork roast in the crock pot. And I sweetened it up with root beer:

A roast split in half, with an onion and season on top. Ready for some root beer!

With most of that can of root beer added.

After 4 hours on high, it was tender and pulled apart well. I saved the onions and juice, shredded the meat, put the meat back in the crock, and added back about half the liquid until it was moist enough. Tasty and sweet!

Lift Bridge Mini Donut Cream Soda

In the name of having just been to the State Fair, it was time to try this glorious can:

Brand: Lift Bridge Mini Donut Cream Soda

Origin: Stillwater, MN.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Natural Sugar.

Review: This was odd... but pretty good. It was cinnamon and sugar flavored, much like mini donuts. And it had the creaminess of a cream soda. I was trying to put my finger on the flavor, and I realized it's a bit like a snickerdoodle cookie... which is a bit cinnamony and sugary as well. It's a pretty decent flavor, and QUITE sweet. So you have to like sweet sodas to like this.

Score: 7 out of 10.

Lunds Soda Selection

I was at Lunds in St. Paul yesterday, and I noticed they had really added to their individual bottle soda selection:

In the past, they had maybe a few bottles, and then a few options of 4-packs or 6-packs (as you see on the right in this photo). But this was a LOT more individual bottles than I'd seen before. I picked up 2 to try at home (an "O-So" and a "Route 66"). Thanks Lunds!

Judge For Yourself! Root Beer

I opened this up tonight:

Brand: Judge For Yourself! Root Beer

Origin: Gardena, CA.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: The side of this bottle said "So good it should be banned." And "Judgement day cometh to those who have lost their fizz." Good stuff. The taste? Well, it was OK. It was a bit heavy on the anise for me, but had a nice frothy head. It was just OK - nothing great, but still drinkable. So I'll give it an average score.

Score: 5 out of 10.

Blueberry Whistler Soda

I've had some issues with Whistler sodas not holding on to their seal. So this soda is one that I picked up earlier this summer before it had time to really lose its carbonation:

Well, the amount that was lost in this bottle wasn't a good sign from the start. And guess what? It was TOTALLY FLAT. Blue Sun Soda really needs to check something on their Whistler bottling machine because they are NOT holding seals!


Brand: Blueberry Whistler Soda.

Origin: Spring Lake Park, MN.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Sugar.

Review: The flavor was good, but it was dead flat, and that's just so annoying. From now on, I'll get Whistler sodas and drink then within the week. Heck, I might open one at Blue Sun Soda to make sure it's actually NOT flat right off the bat. Again, the flavor was nice - it reminded me of the blueberry "chips" that are in blueberry muffin mixes. But it was hard to get past the flat-ness.

Score: 6 out of 10.

Photos from the First "Minnesota Soda Festival"

Yesterday morning, my boys and I stopped by the Minnesota Soda Festival at Blue Sun Soda. It was raining when we got there as it started at 10 a.m., so it was pretty quiet at that time:

Soda sampling on 3 sides of the back of the building.

The Whistler Soda bottling machine inside.

Bottles and flavoring (to the right).

My boys playing some pinball inside.

Again, very quiet at 10 a.m. when it was raining.
There's Charlie in the orange, and Henry in the green playing Skee Ball.

The rain had stopped out back, so we headed out again! (They had food trucks there too.)

Of COURSE the boys wanted to try the "gross" sounding sodas (that are actually quite tasty).

For the soda tastings, you purchase tickets for 25 cents each, and then get a tiny shot of each kid of soda that you request. (I believe there were better prices if you wanted to try/drink a LOT.) Here's my boys getting their first sips of "Zombie Brain Juice:"

I tried the purple "Unicorn Yack" which showed a barfing unicorn. Tasty!

Charlie asking for more at the Whistler stand.

More people and families showing up.

I bought $3 worth of tickets (so 12 sips). I really only had 1 all to myself (the Unicorn Yack), and the boys had the rest as I tried tiny sips of theirs. We had 2 kinds of Dad's, a few kinds of Spring Grove, some Frostie root beer, the "gross" flavors above, Whistler above, and we ended by sharing some Virgil's.

They had a few different bouncy things there, and even though they were wet, lots of kids were in them.

More and more people showing up around 11:30.

It was a fun time, and luckily the weather turned around quickly enough to not ruin the whole day for the event. And Charlie had a great time with their famous Soda Jerk Billy who was ALL personality - he got his finger "stuck" trying to clean out an empty soda bottle, and Henry (my older son) yanked and yanked and couldn't pull it off for him. But Charlie zipped it off with one easy try, and felt like a stud. Then Billy did it again. It was cute.

Thanks Blue Sun Soda!